Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1887-03-10
The Three Periods of Lineoln's Life.
Nicolay and Hay, in March Century.

Nicolay and Hay, in March Century,
We shall see in the course of the pres
ent work the life of Abraham Lincoln di-
vides itself into three principal periods,
with corresponding stages of his intel
lectual development; the first of about
forty years, ending with his term in Con-
gress; the second, of about ten years, con-
Guiding with his final campaign of poIiti-
cal speech making in New York and New
England, shortly before the presidential
nominations of 1860; and the last, of
about five years, terminating at his death
We have thus far traced his career
through the first period of forty years.
In the several stages of frontier expert
ence through which he bad passed, and
which in the main but repeated the trials
and vicissitudes of thousands of other
boys and youths in the West, only so
much individuality had been developed in
him as brought him into the leading class
of his contemporaries. He had risen
from laborer to student, from clerk to
lawyer, from.politiciar to legislator. That
he had lifted himself by healthy ambi-
tlon and unaided industry out of the sta
ton of a Farmland, whose routine life
begins and ends in a back-woods log
cabin, to that representative character
and authority which seated him in the
National Capitol to aid in framing laws
for his country, was already an achieve
ment that may we'll be held honorably to
crown career of forty years.
Such achievement and such distinc-
ton, however, were not so uncommon as
to appear phenomenal. Hundreds of other
boys, born In log cabins, had won similar
elevation IN the manly, practical school
WaStnr1, y1I1hI
times there still remained within the
reach of average intelIects several higher
grades of public service. 1t is quite prob
able that the superior talents of Lincoln
would have made him Governor of Hi
nois or given him term in the United
States Senate. But the story of his life
would not have commanded, as it now
does, the uHfagging attention of posteri-
ty had there not fallen upon his genera
t1on the usual conditions and opportuni
ties brought about by a series of re-
markable commissions in national politics. |
1t we would correctly understand how
Lincoln became, first a conspicuous actor,
and then chosen leader, in great strife
of national parties for supremacy and
power, We must briefly study the origin
and development of the great slavery
controversy in American legislation
which found its highest activity and de-
cls1Ve elimination in the single decade
from 1850 to 1860. We should greatly
err, however, if we attributed the new
events IN L1ncoln's career to the caprice
Of fortune. The conditions and oppor-
tunities of which we speak were broadly
national, and open to all without restric-
ton of rank or locality. Many of his
contemporaries had seemingly over
shadowing advantages by prominence
and training, to sieze and appropriate
them to their own advancement. 1t is
precisely this careful study of the times |
which shows Us by what inevitable pro-
cess of selection honors and labors of |
which he did not dream fell upon him;
how, indeed, it was not the individual who
gained the prize, but the paramount duty
which claimed the man